cedar beam for the sliding panel door

This is the track for the sliding panel that will hide the washer/dryer or serve as a privacy door for the shower area. We had to add another board so the door will clear the wall as it slides by, and put the rails up twice because we forgot the cars.

putting up the track


view from west side of room


Tom used 3 boards to mount the track and covered them with cedar so it looks like a single large beam. The bathroom smells great in this picture from all the cut cedar.

cutting the cedar


attaching the cedar beam


finished view from north side of room

we have a shower!!!

For the first time in over a year we are able to bathe in the house again. It felt gloriously decadent to take a shower at home. Tom grouted the last of the shower and replaced the temporary drain with a rubbed bronze one.


Everything works, and the bathroom built up a nice warm steam. The house can be very cold (it's 58 degrees in the room where I'm writing) so we can use a warm room. (In summer I think the transom window will help the heat escape, and we won't need to use much hot water).

The experimental rain shower head puts out a generous amount of water, but it probably needs to be adjusted. Water only came out of the periphery even though there are holes in the center. After trying out the shower Tom is thinking about redesigning it so the spray covers a wide area. The overhead spray really complements the handheld shower.

It felt very spacious compared to the shower stalls and bathtub showers I've been using before.

We decided that we need a shower door. Initially we were hoping to avoid one -- the look is much cleaner -- but I think the "snail shell" design requires a lot more space. Tom mounted the shower head so it sprays away from the doorway, but with a hand held shower you are still likely to blast it in the wrong direction sometimes. I'm glad we are using marine varnish on the exterior door because it will probably still get a little wet. We talked about possibly tiling further up the wall, and varnishing the ceiling, but nothing firm yet.

sheet rock in the washer/dryer closet

I have been taping sheet rock in the washer/dryer closet and caulking cracks. There are some places that I will have to hit again with the sheet rock cement (putty? spackle?). I forget the proper name but I hate the stuff because it sticks to the plastic bag and dries around the edges. I'm still not sure when to use the paper tape and when to use the plastic mesh stuff. At the trim I gave up and used ordinary caulk, which is much easier.

moved the sink

The other major change this week is that we moved the sink from our W.C. to the big room so it is equally close to both toilets. Tom installed a towel bar today.

shower almost complete

Tom is grouting the shower at last. He's finished with the floors in all three parts of the bathroom, and this picture shows the bottom half of the shower wall. The only thing left is the upper part of the shower and we can actually bathe in the house again. Tom found a set of handles at Habitat for Humanity for a few bucks that he is going to make to match the bronze finish on the hand shower and water spout. With any luck we'll have a fully operational battle station by the end of 2009!

first post

This will be the ongoing exploits as we restore our house. We bought the slanty shanty in 2000 when we moved back to central Texas. It was listed as "Investment Property. Needs TLC." It wasn't our favorite house, but was reasonably priced and located on a quiet street. Two long-term tenants in the garage and euphemistically titled "guest house" would help offset the mortgage. It would be six months before we moved into the house. eight years later we are still working on it. Whenever people come through the house now we say "you have no idea what it used to look like." Hopefully this blog will be a place to show how far we've come and provide encouragement when we think about how far we have to go.